by Chris Bodenner
Amira Al Hussaini of Global Voices reports that it is. But Alexis gets a different story from Facebook:
"We are aware of reports of disruption to service but have not seen any major changes in traffic from Egypt," [spokesperson Andrew] Noyes wrote in an email.
Of course, as we learned from the Tunisian riots, the government could have something else in mind altogether. In that case, the government had slipped malware in-between users and Facebook to steal their passwords. I got one anonymous report that appeared to claim a similar operation was in the works in Egypt. A source wrote in saying "the ministry of Interior wanted to record all activist personal data" on Facebook and that "all activist information is now on the ministry server." I'm digging in to see what else I can find.
As far as Twitter, Al-Masry Al-Youm reports that the Egyptian government planned its shutdown well in advance of yesterday's uprising.